"You might have been to heaven and back since I saw you; you're so
radiant!" she said.
"I have been to heaven. But I haven't come back. I'm there now,"
Victoria answered. "Look--and tell me what you see."
Saidee put the glasses to her eyes. "I see a man in European clothes,"
she said. "I can see that he's young. I should think he's a gentleman,
and good looking----"
"Oh, he is!" broke in Victoria, childishly.
"Do you know him?"
"I've been praying and longing for him to find me, and save us. He's an
Englishman. His name is Stephen Knight. He promised to come if I called,
and I have. Oh, _how_ I've called, day and night, night and day!"
"You never told me."
"I waited. Somehow I--couldn't speak of him, even to you."
"I've told _you_ everything."
"But I had nothing to tell, really--nothing I could have put into words.
And you might only have laughed if I'd said 'There's a man I know in
Algiers who hasn't any idea where I am, but I think he'll come here, and
take us both away.'"
"Are you engaged to each other?" Saidee asked, curiously, even
enviously.
"Oh no! But--but----"
"But what? Do you mean you will be--if you ever get away from this
place?"
"I hope so," the girl answered bravely, with a deep blush. "He has never
asked me. We haven't known each other long--a very little while, only
since the night I left London for Paris. Yet he's the first man I ever
cared about, and I think of him all the time.
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